Flourish/Inspire, Staff

What steps have you taken in the past 12 months that actually helped you and your international Christian school colleagues do school improvement better?

/ mkessenburg

This blog post is part of a series on your improvement engine—make sure you have a great improvement engine (purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices) before you start working on your improvement goal! (See also School Improvement Reflection Protocol).

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Like you, I want to get better at improving. I want to more effectively and efficiently improve. I want to find ways to go farther faster. 

Let me ask you 3 questions:

Question 1: What steps have you taken in the past 12 months that actually helped you and your international Christian school colleagues do school improvement even better? 

  • I’m asking because I want to find out what’s working for others and try it out.
  • I’m asking because working on school improvement goals is a challenge—one that can crowd out working on ways to do school improvement better.
  • I’m asking because you might be making school improvement harder to do than it needs to be. 

Photo by Bruno Nascimento on Unsplash

Question 2: What steps could you take in the next 12 months to do school improvement even better? Here are some possibilities:

(1) Overcommunicate the why, how, and what of school improvement.

(2) Clarify what does and doesn’t help with school improvement.

(3) Document your improvement purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices. Make these documents accessible, use them regularly, and review/revise them annually.

(4) Establish a galvanizing purpose for school improvement.

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(5) At each improvement meeting:

  • Include a well-being component (for example, ask everyone to share a recent high and low).
  • Help everyone know how each meeting fits into the big picture. You can do this by connecting (as appropriate) the mission, vision, improvement process, and improvement goal to each meeting.

(6) Deepen shared understanding of what improvement is, what your improvement system is, and what helps you and your colleagues stay focused on improvement.

(7) Study and discuss mindsets that impact school improvement, for example, growth, fixed, thrive, and survive:

Growth mindsetFixed mindset
The goal of our self-study and visit is to
learn how we can be an even better school		The goal of our self-study and visit is to
show how good of a school we are
The visiting team report helps us improveThe visiting team report is an indictment
Each recommendation we received
from the visiting team is an
exciting opportunity for us to work hard & grow		Each recommendation we received
from the visiting team indicates a
deficiency 
Let’s talk with other schools that are better than us at this so we can learn how to improveWhy are they making us do this? Other schools are simply better than us at this, so why try? 

*The above chart is based on this video and this video. To learn more, read this blog.

Thrive mindset focuses on…Survive mindset focuses on…
Being proactive on what’s important.Being reactive to what’s urgent.
Prevention.Addressing symptoms.
Developing systems.Completing tasks.
Using documentation.Using personal recollection.
Carrying out ongoing processes
and multi-year plans.		Completing projects.
Helping both current and future
students, staff, and leaders to flourish.		Getting through today, this week, this month.

*To learn more, read this blog.

(8) Ensure that your school improvement process:

Additionally, consider having domain committees meet twice each year and considering using the Working Genius model to analyze the composition of your Steering Committee and to determine next steps.

(9) Ensure that your improvement plan:

  • Is documented and evidence-based.
  • Includes key components like goal, due date, action steps, resources, and evidence of progress. 
  • Is formatted effectively.
  • Is understood and used by staff and leaders.

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(10) Address the root causes of each action plan, for example: unhelpful mindsets, insufficient staffing, inadequate policies and processes, faulty assumptions and misunderstandings, a lack of training/expertise, and insufficient shared understanding of a given facet of Christian education (for example, curriculum, well-being, using student assessment data, and helping students grow strong in Jesus).

(11) Ensure that your improvement practices get results, get used, and get staff and leaders experiencing the 5 elements of flourishing: passionate purpose, resilient well-being, healthy relationships, transformative learning, and helpful resources. Here are sample practices:

  • Ask questions.
  • Frequently talk about improvement.
  • Put improvement tasks on your calendar.
  • Do daily, weekly, quarterly, and annual reviews to think about what happened and to determine next steps.
  • Use a scoreboard to track progress on my goals.
  • Before starting to work on a goal, review the School Improvement Framework and the Improvement Engine: purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices.
  • Use Radical Candor (video, chart).

(12) Work with a coach. On a time-permitting basis, I provide free coaching for international Christian schools. Interested? Feel free to contact me.

Question 3: Now what? What’s 1 thing you can do to help you and your international Christian school colleagues do school improvement even better?

Bottom line: Help your international Christian school colleagues do school improvement even better!

Get flourishing!

Michael

How can you use the working genius model to enhance school improvement?

/ mkessenburg

Source

Use the working genius model to enhance school improvement! This model by Patrick Lenicioni is composed of 6 components;

  1. Wonder: Identify a problem or a potential growth area.
  2. Invention: Invent solutions to the problem or the potential growth area.
  3. Discernment: Determine the viability of solutions and how to improve them.
  4. Galvanizing: Get people geared up to address the problem/growth area by using the solution.
  5. Enablement: Offer help.
  6. Tenacity: Get it done.

To learn more, check out the following video:

How can you use the working genius model to enhance school improvement? What comes to mind for me includes the following:

(1) Be sure to galvanize others. It’s not enough to invent a solution and then use it. You need to galvanize people—get them energized, inspired, and moving! (Lack of galvanization can result in people being uninterested, uninspired, and unengaged. Not good.)

You need to galvanize people before the work starts, and you need to regularly galvanize them as they work. One way to do this is to remind them of the purpose of improvement and how addressing this problem/growth area will help others flourish.

(2) Assess your Steering Committee/Leadership Team in terms of working geniuses to ensure you have a good mix. Read this helpful article, assess the geniuses represented on your team, and determine next steps.

(3) As school improvement coordinator, assess your own working geniuses, how they fit with your school’s improvement efforts, and determine next steps. For example, to coordinate efforts to implement the school improvement plan, you need Tenacity. If Tenacity is not one of your working geniuses, you’re going to need to find a way to adapt.

(4) Use Wonder, Invention, and Discernment to review and enhance your improvement engine (purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices).

Here are some related resources:

Source

Bottom line: Enhance school improvement! Using the working genius model can help.

Get flourishing!

Michael

To what extent is your international Christian school using full-orbed instructional coaching to help teachers flourish?

/ mkessenburg

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Instructional coaching (aka meeting teacher needs) helps international Christian school teachers flourish. As a result of instructional coaching…

(1) New teachers are mentored through the steep learning curve of the first couple of years so they stay in the field and flourish. 

(2) Somewhat experienced teachers receive targeted support to keep adding tools to their pedagogy toolbox. (Some may struggle in one or two areas that keep them from really flourishing, and they can get help in those areas.) 

(3) Veteran teachers get encouragement, a resource every now and then, or a colleague to bounce ideas around with.

(4) Teachers and leaders learn to use data knowledgeably in decision making. (Did your school get an accreditation recommendation related to data use? No shame here—most schools I know have.)

(5) Teachers experience focused, effective professional development. (This includes special speakers, regular meetings, differentiated exploration.)  

(6) Teachers align a relevant, consistent curriculum and content with standards and current best practice. (My first year of teaching, I announced the next novel study according to the curriculum I’d been given, and the students told me they’d read it already. That was frustrating.)  

Photo by Kenny Eliason on Unsplash

Like I said, instructional coaching (aka meeting teacher needs) helps teachers flourish—and unfortunately, in my experience, instructional coaching is underemphasized in international Christian schools for 3 reasons:

(1) Coaching, instead of being seen as something that helps all teachers flourish, is seen as something to help struggling teachers survive. Given that coaching is not frequently used, no one really feels comfortable offering or receiving such support.

(2) Various people (for example, principals, curriculum coordinators, and department chairs) are assigned various tasks to help teachers—but these tasks do not fully cover instructional coaching, and sometimes overlap without sufficient communication by responsible parties.

(3) Those involved in helping teachers have not benefited from training in instructional coaching.

My suggestion? Try the online course 40-Hour Instructional Coaching! 

I sure wish I had had the benefit of this course before becoming a department chair and a curriculum coordinator. If I had, I think I would have been able to help teachers flourish more effectively and efficiently. Here’s why:

(1) The course defines instructional coaching. The authors say, “You will encourage teacher growth through modeling, reflection, data analysis, and high-quality professional development, and this comes in many different forms” (Unit 3, Lesson 2, The Tier-Coach-Grow Model, p. 1). Then they lists some of the ways this can happen:

  • Supporter of student learning
  • Supporter of effective instruction
  • Curriculum and content facilitator
  • Data coach
  • Facilitator for change
  • Learner
  • Professional learning facilitator
  • Resource provider

Note: First, this definition was really helpful to me. When we don’t all agree on a definition or have a common vocabulary, it feels like I am playing a game of blindman’s bluff, swinging wildly at partially perceived but not fully articulated needs. I don’t know what exactly it is I’m doing, who else is doing it, and how we can best do it together.

Second, for schools I served in, I don’t recall all of the above being fully provided. For example, one school didn’t provide data coaching, another didn’t provide curriculum facilitation, and another school didn’t provide professional learning facilitation. 

  • What’s your experience?
  • How does your school define instructional coaching? 
  • What additions might you need to make to your definition so that your teachers receive full-orbed instructional coaching?

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

(2) The course offers helpful content, for example:

(A) The suggestion to have a data wall in my office to model data usage for teachers. (This seems so obvious–why didn’t I think of it before? Maybe because I’m not confident in my own data usage, and so I need the following resource.)

(B) A schoolwide data guide giving 5 categories of data (discipline, engagement, classroom assessment, norm-referenced testing, and process/implementation), types of data in each category, and examples of how to use the data.  

(C) A culture of learning self-assessment tool listing 8 qualities (growth mindset, teacher ownership, avenues for collaboration, leadership values PD, common mission/vision, data valued, sense of trust, and focused school-wide goals). For each quality, it gives negative signs indicating that the school’s culture is toxic and positive signs that the school’s culture is ripe for learning. This would be a great faculty discussion piece, given the authors’ claim that a culture ripe for learning is a prerequisite to any change. This is something that I’d want to work on before putting a lot of effort into professional development and change initiatives.

(D) Checklists of what to do before, during, and after professional development to make it most likely that learning takes root in helpful and lasting ways. Most of these things I learned bit by bit, by experience, for instance, with facilitating professional development book discussions. But it’s great to have these concise lists all in one place, whether for running a cross-check on a big event or a check-up on regular meetings. 

(E) A scheduling plan to help me focus on priorities and get them done. I’ll have to admit I skimmed over this part when I took the 40 Hour Workweek course for teachers, but now taking the course for instructional coaches, I actually implemented some of the ideas, and I’ve found them truly helpful. You can also check out Angela Watson’s free mini-course, the Fewer Things Better Project, based on her book Fewer Things Better: The Courage to Focus on What Matters Most.

(F) A plan for tracking coaching contacts that gives me a quick look at who I met with, when, what we did, and what follow-up I need to do. This is a tool I now use daily.

(G) Three complete bonus lessons on how to support teachers in some specific practices like teaching students time management skills, planning for different student work paces, maximizing instructional time, and streamlining transitions. These are great materials that can be given directly to teachers, and they are also good models of the types of materials that I could develop on my own.  

Bottom line: Help your teachers by providing instructional coaching. (Hint: Enroll in 40-Hour Instructional Coaching today!)

Get flourishing!

Kim

The accreditation visit is finished—what do you & your colleagues need to do before implementing your school’s updated improvement plan?

/ mkessenburg

Photo by RUN 4 FFWPU

You successfully finished your international Christian school’s accreditation visit—congratulations! You’ve received the visiting committee report, complete with new major recommendations. You’ve done some celebrating. And you know that you soon will need to implement your updated improvement plan.

Photo by Pixabay

Question: What do you and your colleagues need to do before implementing your school’s updated improvement plan? Here are 5 things you can do:

(1) Complete an after action review that helps you focus on your purpose, solidify your learning, and get prepared for next steps. Here are 5 of 12 questions from a sample after action review for schools using ACSI’s Inspire:

(2) Review and then assess your improvement engine—your improvement purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices. Use the following scale: Great • Good • OK • Poor

  1. Our purpose for improving is galvanizing, documented, gets used, and actually helps us improve.
  2. Our perspective on school improvement is based on shared understanding and on helpful mindsets (growth not fixed, thrive not survive), is documented, gets used, and actually helps us improve.
  3. Our process for school improvement reflects best practice, is documented, gets used, and actually helps us improve.
  4. Our plan for school improvement reflects best practice, is documented, gets used, and actually helps us improve,
  5. Our practices for school improvement reflect best practice, are documented, get used, and actually help us achieve our plan.

Reflect on your assessment results, and determine next steps.

(3) Decide if you want to include a separate action plan that is designed to get your students, staff, and/or leaders flourishing. Please give this careful consideration. I recognize that adding another action plan means more work, and I recognize that in Christian education, the priority is to get students, staff, and leaders holistically flourishing in Jesus.

(4) Use the new major recommendations to update your improvement plan, ensuring that your plan fully addresses:

Note: For a tool you can use to check your plan, see School Improvement Reflection Protocol, p. 2.

(5) Work with an external coach to… 

  • Review your after action review, improvement engine, discussion of a separate action plan on flourishing, and updated action plan; and then to make revisions as necessary.
  • Regularly reflect on school improvement, including the implementation of the updated plan. 

Note: On a time-permitting basis, I provide free coaching for staff and leaders serving in international Christian schools. Interested? Please contact me.

Photo by Tony Hand on Unsplash

Here are 5 related blog posts:

Bottom line: Get off to a good start with implementing your updated improvement plan!

Get flourishing!

Michael

To what extent do you intentionally and thoroughly address root causes of each of your international Christian school’s accreditation recommendations?

/ mkessenburg

This blog post is part of a series on your improvement engine—make sure you have a great improvement engine (purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices) before you start working on your improvement goal!

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Intentionally and thoroughly address root causes of each of your accreditation recommendations! Why? 

(1) Because addressing root causes helps students, staff, and leaders at your international Christian school to get flourishing.

(2) Because addressing root causes increases the likelihood that you’ll address the actual problem, prevent future problems, and achieve lasting change.

(3) Because not addressing root causes increases the likelihood that you’ll address symptoms of the problem, face the problem again, and achieve temporary change.

(4) Because addressing root causes is a best practice.

Let me ask you another question: In the chart below, which international Christian school is more likely to actually improve?

School #1School #2
Proactively frames the recommendations as an opportunity to help students, staff, and leaders flourishReacts to the recommendations with urgency and possibly thinks of the recommendations as something the staff is forced to do
Focuses on prevention (addressing root causes) and on completing the recommendationsFocuses on getting done with the recommendations
Documents root causesDoesn’t document root causes
Intentionally and thoroughly addresses root causes in the plan and completes the recommendationsGets done with the recommendations

My answer? School #1. 

While both schools get the recommendations done, School #2 places too much emphasis on getting done, on urgency. School #2 is about, for example, getting rid of the weeds by pulling off the tops of the weeds (not the roots)—which is sort of like students who work for grades (not learning). Not good.

Meanwhile, School #1 sees recommendations as an opportunity to grow, to prevent problems, to address root causes. School #1, for example, is about getting rid of the weeds by pulling up the weeds by the roots and by putting weed killer on the yard—which is sort of like students who focus on learning (while getting good grades).

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Your turn—for each recommendation you received from your last accreditation visit, ask yourself the following questions:

(1) What are the root causes of this recommendation? Possible root causes include unhelpful mindsets, insufficient staffing, inadequate policies and processes, faulty assumptions and misunderstandings, a lack of training/expertise, and insufficient shared understanding of a given facet of Christian education (for example, curriculum, well-being, using student assessment data, and helping students grow strong in Jesus).

(2) To what degree is our School Improvement Engine (purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices) a root cause of this recommendation?

(3) To what degree will we actually improve if we complete this recommendation without thoroughly addressing the root causes?

(4) To what extent does our improvement plan thoroughly address root causes of this accreditation recommendation?

(5) Now what?

Here are some related resources:

Bottom line: Intentionally and thoroughly address root causes when you want to improve! 

Get flourishing!

Michael

Help students flourish as readers by teaching them how to pick books

/ mkessenburg

You’re giving your students time to read–great! You’re giving them access to books they can choose from–fantastic! 

But there are some students who just can’t seem to settle on a book. They spend the whole 10 minutes of independent reading time digging through their backpack for the book they say they have. Or they randomly grab a different book every day off the class library shelf. Or they have the same book, but they’re not making any progress in it—they’re staring out the window or falling asleep–and they’ve read 2 pages in a week. 

They’re not flourishing as readers. And it may be because they don’t know how to choose a book they might be interested in. To a reading adult, this might sound crazy. But think about it for a minute. How do you choose a book? 

I use a variety of things to choose a book—and these things make up my book selection system. Here are some of the things I do: 

  1. I follow book bloggers (like Reading Middle Grade, The Brainstorm Plus, Redeemed Reader, and Imagination Soup). 
  2. I get recommendations from my friends. (One recently recommended What You Are Looking For Is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama. I loved it!) 
  3. I have favorite authors (like Gary Schmidt, Alan Gratz, and Louise Penny). 
  4. I know what genres and topics I love (like historical fiction and international settings). 
  5. I pay attention when book awards come out. 
  6. I browse bookstore shelves and library shelves. 
  7. I keep a running want-to-read list on Goodreads.
  8. I make use of the hold system at my public library.

How did I build my system? I’m not sure. But I was born into a home that was full of books. As a child, I was taken regularly to the public library where I checked out every book on horses I could get my hands on. My mom read books to me, and I learned early that I loved fantasy, like the Narnia series, and that I loved its author, C.S. Lewis. I had friends who shared their books with me–one in elementary school who had the entire Nancy Drew series, and another in middle school who had the entire Anne of Green Gables series.  

What if I hadn’t had all that? Is it possible that I might not have any idea how to pick a book? Yes, it’s very possible.

Photo by Siora Photography on Unsplash

So, what are some things we can teach students about how to pick a book? Here are some that come to mind for me:

(1) Look for a book that will grab you. Not everyone will like every book. People have very different tastes. If a particular book doesn’t grab you, abandon it and move on. 

(2) Think about your preferences: What books have you enjoyed in the past? What authors, genres, topics? Can you find a similar book? 

(3) Examine a book: check out the front cover, the back cover. Read the first page. 

(4) Talk to your friends about what they like to read. Maybe you’ll like it, too.

(4) Ask an adult for a recommendation—a librarian, your English teacher, or another adult in your life who knows books.

(5) Keep a list of titles you come across that you might like to read. That way when you finish a book, you know exactly what you want to read next.

What can we do in class to give students scaffolded practice choosing books? Here are some things I’ve done: 

(1) Start the term with an activity like a book pass or book tasting designed to give students the opportunity to examine a lot of books, chat with classmates about them, and write down titles they find interesting.

(2) Have students keep a want-to-read list.

(3) Orient students to how to find books in the places they have access—a classroom library (mine was organized by genre), an online library (a little class time to figure out how to log in, download the app, and use the search function might just be the push a couple of them need), a school library, or a public library.

(4) Occasionally have students turn to the person next to them and share something about the book they’re reading.

(5) Give your class book talks—just 2-minute ads—about books they might find interesting.

(6) Once a term, a first-line tournament is fun. Just have students pair up, read the first line of their book to their partner, and then decide which is the best. The loser sits down, and the winner finds another partner. The final playoff is decided by the whole class.

(7) End the term with students giving book talks to the class.

(8) Give students time to reflect on their book choosing strategies—what strategies they’ve used, which have been most helpful, which they’d like to use more of next term.

Bottom line:  Teach students strategies for picking a book, and give them scaffolded practice using those strategies. (Remember, access to books and time to read isn’t enough to get every student deeply involved in reading.)

How about you? How do you choose books? How do your students choose books? How have you helped them? How can you help them even more?

If you have additional strategies and scaffolded practice ideas, let me know!

Get flourishing!

Kim

P.S. To do a deeper dive into supporting independent reading, check out the following books:

(1) Book Love: Developing Depth, Stamina, and Passion in Adolescent Readers by Penny Kittle

(2) The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller

(3) The Joy of Reading by Teri Lesesne and Donalyn Miller

(4) Passionate Readers: The Art of Reaching and Engaging Every Child by Pernille Ripp

What role does reflection play in your international Christian school’s improvement?

/ mkessenburg

This blog post is part of a series on your improvement engine—make sure you have a great improvement engine (purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices) before you start working on your improvement goal!

Photo by Ümit Bulut on Unsplash

Reflection can help you and your colleagues to improve your international Christian school! Why?

  • Because reflection helps you and your colleagues flourish.
  • Because reflection helps you and your colleagues to step back, assess what’s happening, and determine next steps.
  • Because not reflecting can result in you and your colleagues not seeing the big picture, not understanding what’s happening, and not determining next steps. Not good.
  • Because reflection is a best practice.

To what extent do you and your colleagues reflect on school improvement? What does reflecting on school improvement look like at your school? What it looks like for me includes weekly reviews, quarterly reviews, and annual reviews which include using this reflection tool and after action reviews.

Image by tartila on Freepik

What helps you and your colleagues reflect? I find that a set of questions helps me and my colleagues reflect. Here are 4 questions that can help you and your colleagues:

(1) How are you doing right now? Use the following scale: 10: flourishing • 1: flailing

(2) How are you doing with regard to school improvement?

  • What 3 insights did you personally gain this school year regarding school improvement?
  • What 3 school improvement accomplishments for this school year do you want to celebrate?
  • What 3 concerns about school improvement do you personally have going forward?

(3) What’s driving your school’s improvement efforts? For me, a school’s improvement is driven by the 5P improvement engine:

  • Purpose
  • Perspective
  • Process
  • Plan
  • Practices

(4) How can you enhance what’s driving your school’s improvement efforts?

(5) What are your highlights/insights for this reflection?

2 tips: For an expanded version of these questions, click here! If you want to talk with me about reflecting on school improvement, click here!

Get flourishing!

Michael

What does and doesn’t help you improve personally?

/ mkessenburg

This blog post is part of a series on your improvement engine—make sure you have a great improvement engine (purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices) before you start working on your improvement goal!

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Use what helps you improve! Why?

(1) Because using what helps you improve gets you flourishing.

(2) Because using what helps you improve keeps you focused and persisting when the going gets tough, keeps you open to new opportunities, and keeps you working both effectively and efficiently.

(3) Because using what doesn’t help you improve can cause you to give up when things get tough, to avoid growth opportunities, and to work ineffectively and inefficiently. Not good.

(4) Because using what helps you improve is a best practice.

So, what helps and doesn’t help you to improve? When thinking about what helps and doesn’t help you as a staff member or leader of international Christian school to improve, what comes to mind for me include the following:

What helps…What doesn’t help…
Keeping your galvanizing purpose for improvement in the forefront of your mind.Having no clear purpose for improvement or having one that doesn’t galvanize you.
Having a perspective on improvement that flows from a growth mindset.Having a perspective on improvement that flows from a fixed mindset.
Using a process that includes reviewing your purpose for improvement, assessing your current situation, taking action steps, assessing and celebrating progress, and determining next steps.Having no documented process, or having a process that doesn’t include key components.
Using a personalized flourishing plan that gets you experiencing the 5 elements of flourishing.Not having a documented plan that you can easily access.
Using the practice of scheduling your improvement tasks before scheduling other tasks.Using the practice of letting other tasks crowd out your improvement tasks—so you don’t get around to doing them.

My first point: What can really help you improve is your 5P improvement engine:

  1. Purpose
  2. Perspective
  3. Process
  4. Plan
  5. Practices 

I say your improvement engine “can help” because how much it helps depends on its quality. If your engine is great, your engine will really help you improve. If your engine isn’t great (like if you’re missing components or if your components aren’t of good quality), it might not help all that much.

Photo by Bradley Singleton on Unsplash

My second point: Your 5P improvement engine is what actually drives your improvement. So check your engine before taking action on your goal. 

Let me put it another way: Imagine your goal is to drive from Los Angeles to Seattle to New York City to Miami and back to Los Angeles, a long trip. Before driving, you’d want to make sure your engine (not to mention the rest of your car) is in good working order. 

Before taking action on your goal, make sure you have a great 5P improvement engine!

Photo by Clark Tibbs on Unsplash

What can you do to enhance your 5P improvement engine?  Here are some suggestions:

(1) Purpose: When talking about 1 or more of your improvement goals, recite your purpose for improvement.

(2) Perspective: Assess your own growth/fixed mindset. Next, apply the results of your assessment in 3 ways. Share with a colleague.

(3) Process: Use daily, weekly, quarterly, and annual reviews to assess progress and determine next steps.

(4) Plan: Explore various plan templates, using what you learn to enhance your engine. Here are 3 sample plans: Quick Win, Personalized Flourishing Plan, and Stop Self-Neglect/Start Self-Care. And explore the root causes of each of your goals.

(5) Practice: Ask open-ended questions, instead of giving advice.

Note: “You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems” (James Clear). 

Photo by kaleb tapp on Unsplash

Bottom line: Use what helps you improve! Enhance your 5P improvement engine: purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices.

Get flourishing!

Michael

At your international Christian school, what does and doesn’t help you and your colleagues improve?

/ mkessenburg

This blog post is part of a series on your improvement engine—make sure you have a great improvement engine (purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices) before you start working on your improvement goal! (See also School Improvement Reflection Protocol).

Image by jcomp on Freepik

Use what helps you and your colleagues improve! Why?

(1) Because using what helps you and your colleagues improve gets all of you flourishing.

(2) Because using what helps you and your colleagues improve increases the likelihood that you’ll enjoy working to improve, that you’ll work effectively and efficiently, and that you’ll successfully improve.

(3) Because using what doesn’t help you and your colleagues improve increases the likelihood that you’ll be frustrated as you work on school improvement, that you’ll work ineffectively and inefficiently, and that you won’t successfully improve (about 70% of improvement efforts are unsuccessful). Not good.

(4) Because using what helps you improve is a best practice.

So, what helps and doesn’t help you and your colleagues to improve? When think about what helps and doesn’t help international Christian school staff improve, what comes to mind for me include the following:

What helps…What doesn’t help…
Having a clear, documented purpose for school improvement that galvanized you and your colleagues.Having an unclear, undocumented purpose for improvement or having one that doesn’t galvanize you.
Having a unified perspective of school improvement—making it easier to work together.Having a fragmented perspective of school improvement—which makes it harder to work together.
Using a process that includes reviewing your purpose for improvement, assessing the current situation, taking action steps, assessing and celebrating progress, and determining next steps.Having no documented process, or having a process that doesn’t include key components.
Having a documented, evidence-based plan that addresses root causes, includes key components, is formatted effectively, and gets you and your colleagues experiencing the 5 elements of flourishing.Having an undocumented plan that isn’t all that helpful and doesn’t get used.
Using practices that get results and get used.Using practices that look good but don’t really help and that are hard to use.

My first point: What can really help you and your colleagues improve is your school’s 5P improvement engine:

  1. Purpose
  2. Perspective
  3. Process
  4. Plan
  5. Practices 

I say your improvement engine “can help” because how much it helps depends on the quality of your improvement engine. If your engine is great, your engine will really help. If your engine isn’t great (like if you’re missing components or if your components aren’t of good quality), it might not help all that much.

Photo by Tim Meyer on Unsplash

My second point: Your 5P improvement engine is what actually drives school improvement. So check your engine before taking action on your goal. 

Let me put it another way: Imagine your goal is to drive from Miami to Anchorage and back, a trip of over 9,800 miles. Before driving, you’d want to make sure your engine (not to mention the rest of your car) is in good working order. 

Before taking action on your goal, make sure you have a great 5P improvement engine!

Photo by Ava Sol on Unsplash

What can you do to enhance your school’s 5P improvement engine?  Here are some suggestions:

(1) Purpose: Ensure your purpose is galvanizing—meaning, it focuses on improvement (not maintenance), it’s specific, and it’s about people (about you and your colleagues).

(2) Perspective: Use the School Improvement Framework to collaboratively develop a unified perspective of school improvement.

(3) Process: Ensure your process is ongoing, documented, collaborative, contains key components, and gets you and your colleagues experiencing the 5 elements of flourishing: passionate purpose, resilient well-being, healthy relationships, transformative learning, and helpful resources.

(4) Plan: Explore various school improvement plan templates, using what you learn to enhance your engine. Click here to explore a basic plan (tab 1) and an upgraded plan (tab 2).

(5) Practice: Start each school improvement meeting with a review of the purpose, the improvement goal, and the meeting’s focus. 

Note: “You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems” (James Clear). 

Image by felicities on Freepik

Bottom line: Use what helps you and your colleagues improve! Enhance your school’s 5P improvement engine: purpose, perspective, process, plan, and practices. (See also School Improvement Reflection Protocol.)

Get flourishing!

Michael

What do you want to know? How are you going to learn it? (Hint: Try a book discussion!)

/ mkessenburg

Photo by Tom Hermans on Unsplash

What do you want to know? 

  • What is that 1 thing about your content, your pedagogy, your students, or your well-being that you’d really like to grow in? Is it student motivation? Project-based learning? Using AI in school? Making the most of independent reading? Engaging English language learners? 
  • How could engaging with that 1 thing help you help yourself, your colleagues, and your students flourish even more?

How are you going to learn what you want to know? Here’s a 4-step process you can use that includes a book discussion—I love reading!

  1. Pick 1 your 1 thing. 
  2. Find 1 colleague at your school or elsewhere who is also interested in that topic. You might be able to find more than 1 colleague!
  3. Collaboratively work with your colleagues to pick 1 book to read, but first do some research on good books to read. You and your colleagues can do this by reading book reviews, seeing what ACSD offers, or talking with others. 
  4. Purchase the book. Then with your colleague, read, discuss, and apply a chapter every week or two. 

Over the years, I’ve enjoyed doing many in-person book discussions with groups of colleagues from my school. This school year I learned it also works to do a book discussion online with just 1 person. And because there were only 2 of us, each discussion took less time. We did it in 30 minutes every 2 weeks, while my colleague was eating her lunch!  

What did our 30-minute book discussion look like? We used the time to… 

  • Report on ways we’d implemented things we’d learned in the past 2 weeks. 
  • Discuss what we found interesting from the chapter we’d read for this meeting.
  • Brainstorm how we could implement ideas from the new reading.
  • Pray for each other.

Source

The 1 thing my colleague was interested in was how to help students displaying traits suggesting Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). So, I contacted a friend who had been a learning resource specialist and asked her for a recommendation, which was Decoding Autism and Leading the Way to Successful Inclusion by Barbara Boroson (an educational specialist, and also the parent of a child with ASD). 

What did my colleague and I learn? A lot of empathy as well as strategies for helping children with ASD deal with their challenges so they can acquire the content and skills they need to flourish. 

The author goes chapter by chapter through anxiety, executive function, sensation, communication and socialization, engagement and content acquisition, and finally behavior. The first half of each chapter is devoted to explaining what the issue is, and how a student with ASD experiences it. The second half offers tips for helping the student deal with the issue in the classroom. 

Why was behavior addressed last (when that’s what we wanted to address first)? Because accommodating student needs minimizes behavior issues! 

My colleague was so excited about what she learned that she is scheduled to share it with the rest of the elementary teachers at her school at a meeting! And now she wants to learn more about teaching reading: What’s the controversy about? How can we best help students? 

So just like last time, I contacted a friend who serves as an elementary principal. She said her staff was reading Shifting the Balance: 6 Ways to Bring the Science of Reading into the Balanced Literacy Classroom. We look forward to starting that discussion soon!

Source

How about you? What do you want to learn in order to help yourself, your colleagues, and your students flourish even more? How will you learn it, share it, use it? 

My suggestion? Try a book discussion! Find one or more colleagues who want to learn with you. Reach out to someone who can recommend a helpful book. Read, discuss, and implement your reading together over time. Even if it’s only 30 minutes every 2 weeks in a virtual discussion with 1 person–you can still experience transformational learning! 

Get flourishing!

Kim
P.S. Here are a few books I highly recommend: 

(1) The Will to Learn: Cultivating Student Motivation without Losing Your Own

(2) How to Differentiate Instruction in Academically Diverse Classrooms

(3) AI for Educators: Learning Strategies, Teacher Efficiencies, and a Vision for an Artificial Intelligence Future

(4) Book Love: Developing Depth, Stamina, and Passion in Adolescent Readers

(5)The ELL Teacher’s Toolbox: Hundreds of Practical Ideas to Support Your Students